Tell us what you think: Paying for uniforms - Navy News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Navy Times

Tell us what you think: Paying for uniforms

Did you miss out on the higher clothing allowance?

Personnel officials acknowledged last week that sailors who graduated from boot camp between Oct. 1, 2007, and April 27, 2009, did not receive any of the four sets of the blue-and-gray camouflage Navy working uniform, all while sailors in the fleet were given plussed-up clothing replacement allowances in 2008 and 2009 to cover the purchase cost. So once the NWU was issued at boot camp, those sailors who had been issued utilities were forced to purchase their NWUs using either their basic clothing allowance or their own money.

The Navy said sailors who were issued utilities in that timeframe will have until 2012 to purchase all four sets of NWUs, two years later than the rest of the fleet, which must have all the required seabag items by Dec. 31 this year.

The problem is, the Navy is not boosting the clothing replacement allowance for the estimated 60,000 sailors who were issued utilities — and not the NWU — in boot camp. Instead, those sailors must spend the next two years paying for everything with their basic clothing replacement allowance, which is much lower than the 2008 and 2009 allowances that sailors in the fleet received.

The Navy said this decision will not create a hardship for sailors, but critics point out that the annual allowance is supposed to cover the replacement of existing uniforms — not just the NWU, but whites, blues and coveralls as well — and is not high enough to pay for multiple sets of new uniforms.

Navy Times wants to know what you think. Should the Navy pay the higher allowances retroactively to these 60,000 sailors, or will their annual allowances over the next two years be enough to purchase all the required uniforms? If you graduated boot camp in this timeframe, how many sets of uniforms have you been able to purchase with your basic allowance? How well do the uniforms hold up when you don’t have all four sets? Has your command made you buy all the uniforms before a deployment?

E-mail your opinions to reporter Mark D. Faram at mfaram@navytimes.com. Your comments could appear in an upcoming article.